Japanese princess gives up her royal status to marry a beach tourism worker she met in a restaurant

A Japanese princess, Princess Mako, the granddaughter of Japan's emperor, will give up her royal status when she marries a beach tourism worker, Kei Komuro whom she met in a restaurant. The man who won the princess' heart, was a fellow student at International Christian University in Tokyo, where Princess Mako, 25, also graduated.

Princess Mako and Komuro met at a restaurant in Tokyo's Shibuya about five years ago at a party and have been seeing more of each other in recent months. Komuro promotes tourism to the beaches of Shonan in Kanagawa prefecture, a report on public broadcaster NHK said. According to tradition, women can't succeed to the Chrysanthemum Throne in Japan.

Mako's father and her younger brother are in line to succeed Emperor Akihito, after her uncle Crown Prince Naruhito, who is first in line. Even though she will seize been a princess, the process building up to the wedding is likely to take some time and be full of ritual, as Japanese nuptials, especially royal ones, tend to be.

According to NHK, Komuro has already met Mako's parents, and they approve of him. Unlike royalty in Great Britain and other European countries, the emperor and his family tend to be kept away from the public eye, although they travel abroad and appear at cultural events. Princess was a student at the International Christian University (ICU) in Tokyo in April 2010.

In doing so, she became the first member of the Japanese imperial family to attend university, according to Mainichi. As part of her arts and cultural property studies, she attended the University of Edinburgh in Scotland on an exchange.

Having finished at ICU, Princess Make returned to Britain where she gained a masters in art museum and gallery studies from the University of Leicester in January 2016. She is currently working as an affiliate researcher the University Museum of the University of Tokyo whilst combining a doctorate programme at ICU. Source: NHK